


A Hollow Piping

by Magi Silverwolf (Magi_Silverwolf)



Series: Fairy Tales-verse [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Timelines, Background Iron Thorns, Extended First War with Voldemort, Fred the Goat (OC), Gen, Implied Kidnapping, Implied/Referenced Mind Control, Manipulative Albus Dumbledore, Marauders Era (Harry Potter), Misunderstandings, Other, Pregnant Lily Evans Potter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-20
Updated: 2020-10-20
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:09:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,553
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27182254
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Magi_Silverwolf/pseuds/Magi%20Silverwolf
Summary: Sirius misses his friends but he isn't comfortable with how he got them back.
Relationships: Sirius Black & The Potters, Sirius Black/Remus Lupin
Series: Fairy Tales-verse [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1984189
Comments: 2
Kudos: 30
Collections: MC4A Year 3





	A Hollow Piping

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I do not own the original canon nor am I making any profit from writing this piece. All works are accredited to their original authors, performers, and producers while this piece is mine. No copyright infringement is intended. I acknowledge that all views and opinions expressed herein are merely my interpretations of the characters and situations found within the original canon and may not reflect the views and opinions of the original author(s), producer(s), and/or other people.  
> Warnings: This story may contain material that is not suitable for all audiences and may offend some readers. Additionally, it references wartime traumas and implied violations of personal autonomy. Please exercise understanding of personal sensitivities before and during reading.  
> Author’s Note(s): Sirius made me sad in this, but Dumbledore makes me wanna throw a vase at his stupid head. Also, credit for Fred the Goat goes to my zucchini Gwen, who came up with her in their fic “What the Dog Brought Home” and was kind enough to let me use as a gag. (If you ever get a chance, look up what a Damascus goat looks like as both a kid and an adult.)

-= LP =-  
** A Hollow Piping **   
-= LP =-

Sirius knew that the war was wearing on everyone. His generation had it particularly tough, too, because they had grown up with it as a constant thing. It was just one of those things that was constantly there in the background of everyday life. The sun rose in the east; there were ravens at the Tower; and there was a war going on right beneath the noses of the Muggles. The magical community of the British Isles was small, much smaller than the magical communities of other regions and countries. So the war in their community affected everyone, regardless of their politics and whatever their blood status might be.

It wasn’t uncommon for entire families to disappear without warning. The Marauders had had a friend whose entire family had just disappeared in the middle of the night the summer after they had graduated. The McKinnons had been staples of British pure-blood society for years, ever since they had come over from the Continent after the Muggle’s second world war. Marlene was going to help Lily plan her wedding to James. She was going to help Sirius and Remus move into Remus’ grandfather’s cottage that weekend.

_ The Daily Prophet _ had ran their disappearance as a front page spread. There had been pictures of the empty manor house. In uncompromising shades of gray, the accumulated detritus of a lifetime had been displayed to the public. The article announced how all tracking spells, even the ones cast by Unspeakables specializing in them, had failed and the entire house was considered lost.

Remus and Lily had both been devastated, having been the closest to Marlene during their years at Hogwarts. The wedding had been subdued for that loss. Desperate to retain a bit of her past, Lily had invited Petunia to fulfill the role that Marlene would have. It had backfired when Petunia had left after a shouting match that ended with the sisters disavowing each other. Not even Alice catching the bouquet while Frank caught the garter, a matching set if there ever was one, erased the stain of the breaking of familial magic completely.

_ The war was wearing on all of them _ .

Sirius scratched at the neck of his pet goat as she ate from the bowl of leafy greens that he was holding on his lap. Fred made a grunting sound at the touch but didn’t bother looking up from her snack. Lily had helped pick out the pretty white doe that Sirius had gotten as an impulse buy shortly before he and Remus had moved out to the cottage. Now as an adult, Fred wasn’t nearly as conventionally pretty as she had been as a kid. Sirius still loved her.

He hadn’t painted her hooves in over six months, though. That was normally something that he and Lily did together. She and James had moved into a little cottage of their own last year, without even a hint of house-warming. Around the same time, they had both started pulling back from the Order as well. Sirius did not blame them any more than he blamed Remus for disappearing for months on missions to the werewolf packs for the Order. Why, even Peter was busy with things.

Fred pushed the empty bowl off of Sirius’ lap and draped the front half of her body over his legs. Sirius let out a huff at the sudden weight. The cuddles did feel good. She flicked one of her long, curly ears at him, as if scolding him for his drifting thoughts. He scratched between her shoulders.

“I miss my friends,” Sirius said. Fred rumbled in her chest. He didn’t want to think about it too closely, but Fred could keep a secret, couldn’t she? It wasn’t like she could go about spreading whatever he discussed with her at any rate. “On the last mission we had together, James said that he and Lily had some really big news they both wanted to tell me and Remus, and that they were only waiting until a few more things had been confirmed. He seemed really happy, Freddy, but it’s not like him to be skittish about anything. Well, except for when Lily was on a warpath about something he had done.” Sirius smiled bittersweetly at the memory of Lily telling them all off for not respecting her boundaries. “Of course, that’s usually because she’s right and he knows it, just the same as everyone else.”

Sirius looked up at the cloudy sky as he let his thoughts drift some more. It had all started when Lily and James had attended that Muggle music festival in Glastonbury. Lily had joked about it being just as magical as Hogwarts in its own way—something about a king who had been buried nearby, not that Sirius recognized the name overly much. Both of his friends had been ridiculously happy for a month or two before announcing that they were moving but they weren’t going to have a housewarming party right away. That had been around the time that Lily had backed off of missions, focusing more on her research. It had only been another two or three months later that James had made his maddening comment about having news that he and Lily were waiting to tell them.

Now it was nearly six months later, and James was still waiting to tell them. The Potters had even skipped out on spending Christmas together! James had given him a wink before claiming that Lily was too sick to travel too far from their house.

He didn’t like that James had secrets that he wasn’t allowed to know. That wasn’t right. It filled Sirius with a sense of dread, especially with how poorly the war had been going the last few years. He didn’t think that either of the Potters would join the Death Eaters, not after having engaged in direct combats with all of the known members of the inner circle including Voldemort himself. But what else could their distance mean?

“You appear lost in thoughts, my dear boy,” Dumbledore said, snapping Sirius back to the present. Fred screamed a protest before heaving herself up and wandering pointedly away from the headmaster. Dumbledore’s eyes twinkled knowingly down at him. “Very heavy ones, by the look on your face. Would you like to talk about them? A burden shared is a burden lightened, after all.”

“I think something is wrong with Lily,” Sirius confessed with a suddenness that even surprised himself. The words felt right, though, like a truth he hadn’t realized until he had said it. He nodded sharply. “I think there’s something wrong with Lily. James and her have been acting a bit off for coming up on a year now.”

“Ah, yes,” Dumbledore agreed solemnly. “I had noticed that. They had both been rather reluctant of late, haven’t they?”

“They have!” Sirius jumped up to begin pacing in front of the steps he had been sitting on. “I thought it was just normal stuff—they’ve only been married a year or so and wanted time to themselves, especially with the war and all, you know? But then James mentioned Lily being sick,  _ too sick to travel _ , and I’m worried. If Lily is so sick, why hasn’t James taken her to St. Mungo’s? Or called in a healer at the very least? We’ve got a couple in the Order, don’t we? We have nearly everything else!”

“I’m sure that he must have had his reasons,” Dumbledore assured. “He cares for Miss Evans very much, after all. He wouldn’t let her suffer ill health for longer than absolutely necessary. Maybe you should arrange a meeting between young James and myself so that we can get to the bottom of the situation. For the Greater Good, of course.”

“Really?” Sirius asked, pausing in his stressed pacing. He grinned. “That would be great!”

-= LP =-

Sirius didn’t know what Dumbledore had said to James during that meeting, but within a few days, the Potters were moving into a different cottage, this one in Godric’s Hollow just down the street from where Dumbledore had lived while he had attended Hogwarts. Turned out the whole issue was just that Lily was pregnant and they were holding off telling anyone.

Lily didn’t seem happy about their return to the magical world. In fact, she seemed almost hostile about it, more than just moving while six months pregnant would have explained. The focus of her pique seemed to be the headmaster. One time, she had thrown a glass vase at him when he had visited the cottage. She would also deliberately walk out of any room he entered, even if her motions weren’t as fluid as they normally would and it looked as if every step pained her.

Sirius would often stumble across her later as she stared out a window with one hand pressed against the glass. She looked like one of those old paintings of sea widows waiting for their sailors to come home. Discomfort always tickled at his ribs whenever he saw her like that and he would end up feeling like he had missed a step while walking down the stairs.

Somehow, despite having his friends back, it felt like he had lost them for good.

-= LP =-  
 _An Ending_  
-= LP =-

**Author's Note:**

> Challenge/Competition Block:  
> Stacked with: QL (Season 8); MC4A  
> Team (Position): Wigtown Wanderers (Keeper)  
> Round Info: Season 08 – Semi Finals  
> QL Prompt(s)s: Sirius Black; A misunderstanding with negative consequences  
> Individual Challenges: True Colors; Iron Thorns; Gryffindor MC (x2); Professor MC; Shifter MC; Neurodivergent; Lovely Triangle; Shipwreck; Lunar Era; Old Shoes (Y); Short Jog; The Story Goes On; Two Cakes; Green Ribbon  
> Other MC4A Challenges (Prompt): SpB [2C](Sunshine); TrB [1D](Knight Templar); SuB [5A](Dust); AU [5A](Hacker/Programmers); FaB [1B](Fruits/Vegetables); Set [2B](Cottage); Chim [Otis](“Wait for It” - Hamilton); Fire [Hard](Education); Hunt [Fa Con](Vegetables); Garden [Plant Food](Vegetables); Harvest [Act](Cuddling/Snuggling)/[Set](Cottage) /[Set](Different Era)/[Ships](Found Family)/[Fandoms](Harry Potter)  
> Representation: Friends as Family; The First Blood War; Depressed Sirius Black; Pregnant & still BAMF Lily Evans Potter; Fred the Goat; Background Polyship  
> Primary & Secondary Bonus Challenge(s): Dog Star; Call Me Dantes; Sitting Hummingbird; Some Beach; Second Verse (Ladylike; Not a Lamp; Persistence Still; Found Family; Nontraditional; Zucchini Bread; Middle Name; Mother Hen; Spinning Plates; Unwanted Advice; Car in a Tutu; Three’s Company; Deadliest Catch; Lovely Coconuts; Grease Monkey; Lyre Liar; Muck & Slime; Rock of Ages; Hot Apple; Snow Lemon); Chorus (Odd Feathers; Pear-Shaped; Wabi Sabi; Machismo; Peddling Pots; Tomorrow’s Shade; Larger than Life; Unicorn; Vid Tangent; Abandoned Ship; Head of Perseus; In the Trench; Surprise!; Turtle-Duck); Demo 1 (Civil Disobedience); Demo 2 (Toto’s Tribute)  
> Tertiary & Generic Bonus Challenges: T3 (Toad); SN (Rail; Spare); LiCK (Poppy; Narcissus; Yarrow); FR (Gestation); O3 (Orator; Oust); RoIL (Exuviation); War (Orator; Obstruction; Sanctuary; Ennui); TY (Ntaiv); Measure (Ennui; Bisect)  
> Word Count: 1546


End file.
